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You know, it's like, you have this plan for your life... right, and you know what you need to do and what your responsibilities are. Then somebody comes along, and....pushes you off that path.

zhangjiashuais

And there’s me… I’m born.

She laughed, she laughed because he really was standing on nothing but lord forbid the individual that told the great almighty Kevin that. Every time she tried to get words out a laughter ended up coming out instead. “You’re unbelievable,” were the two first words that were audible that came out of her mouth. The woman had needed that, a second of pure laughter in the middle of the hell that she was in, she could appreciate that. “Says the guy that moved in with his ex not even a year after ending whatever we had? You really want to act like you get to pretend to be hurt by what I do or who I decide to be room mates with. Ah – yes he also keeps track of Ezri. They’re kind of in love – I do hope you do know that,” Then again it appeared that Kevin liked coming in second all the time even when he had someone that had once put him first. “Then I am glad nothing has changed for you regarding the big oh complicated life you have,” There it was, the sharp tongue that she had once had, the sharp tongue that had saved her so many times, it was a lifetime ago that she had managed to hear it again. “Right god forbid you think of anything but yourself. – and don’t say the daddy thing makes it about everyone but you because even that – you managed to make it about you. Love how you skipped the information I just shared,” It was her brother, but yeah she was the one even if she had just disclosed that. Somehow everything always ended up being about Kevin, it was there where she just waved her hand to make him just shut the fuck up, “Just go, I ain’t holding you up.” She moved past him as she proceeded to take a table besides the window to figure out what her next step would be.

He bit back the urge to laugh at the fact that she thought he was upset at shacking up with someone else. He wasn’t upset at any of that. He didn’t like Axel. Ezri may have had some big come to Jesus moment but he didn’t share that. He hadn’t spoken to Axel since the shooting, he had no intention of breaking that silence and he was sure the situation was mutual. “You mean our friendship?” he said, “or the relationship you spent every day telling me you didn’t want?” His love life seemed to function in shades of grey but Kevin had learned to just fucking live with it, “Ezri is just as much my ex as you are. And yeah, I know she’s in love with Axel. She’s been in love with him for like ten years.” It didn’t surprise him that Ezri wanted to go back to Axel and had shut the door on them. It was perfect, poetic karma for all the fucked up shit he had done in his life. But he wanted her to be happy, more than he wanted to be happy himself. That was always how their relationship had gone. At least now he knew how to protect himself. “You know what my problem is with you living with the man who tried to kill me? Vanessa’s my problem with it.” Axel wasn’t coming within ten feet of his daughter. He wasn’t taking chances with Ezri, he wasn’t taking chances with Evelyn. Though Ezri seemed to want to be around the child more than her own mother. Kevin rolled her eyes at her comment about it being about her brother. They both knew she had found plenty of solace at the bottom of a bottle, but even he wasn’t low enough to throw that back in her face. “Gladly, let’s not do this again,” he said. He let the comment about everything being about him slide off his back. It was funny how you didn’t have to respond to something so wrong. Nothing was about him or he would have stayed just to fight for a while with her. But that was a door better left closed these days.

“We had but you made a choice at the end of the day,” He had chosen Evelyn, she had thought that everything would’ve worked out with them and that one day down the road they would end up being friends. “I did. Not like me to actually fight for someone but you had already made a choice and I was too late. I think relationships are like that. The timing has to be right and you both have to make the choice to fight for it otherwise the moment just passes away from you and you lose it.” If Kevin and her had gotten together when they were teens, had they been honest from the start then Axel wouldn’t had stood a chance but then Axel came and roles started to change. “I don’t think he doesn’t love me. I just think that he doesn’t understand the concept of being together of actually being a couple you know? I want someone that is there for me during the good and the bad times – not just when things are easy and I want him to live a honest job,” which lord knew that was going to be the hardest thing for Axel to do if they ever did decide that they wanted to do this. As far as she knew she was still living in a dream land because none of this was going to be real, “And then I hear myself talking and know that I have to be real. And in the real world if Axel and I ever were meant to be then I will have to compromise a lot because a white picket fence is not a life for him – like having a kid – I don’t think that would be something that would fit with us. If there even is a us.” Which was such a far fetch dream that just made her moan as she buried her face in her hands, her fingertips pushing her forehead skin above, “I am not that great when it comes to being honest and I think I am just being an idiot. I see him Kev, and all I see is every pain he ever did and then when I don’t have him I just miss him. I miss him so much that sometimes I think I smell his scent – what if he’s now dating Evelyn?”

“We both made choices,” he corrected her. It hadn’t been his choice to categorize them as friends or to constantly say he didn’t want to be with her. But by now he was used to Ezri’s revisionist history. He accepted it as a part of who she was. “Yeah I made that choice after you were gone and after we were so bad for each other we couldn’t be in the same house.” She had walked out when he had begged her to stay and he wasn’t sure anything could erase that. But it didn’t feel great to hear her talk about them like they had been something that had fallen apart. They’d taken a sledgehammer to it in their own ways. They were both too self destructive. Or he was. Ezri still had a shot at getting something good out of this life in the romantic sense. And Kevin had always been a masochist when it came to Ezri. It blew his mind that he once again was in a position to listen to her talk about her feelings for Axel and agonize over them. Except the last time he’d had his entire empire to focus on keeping her away from. Axel had been convenient to doing that and it had been what she wanted to he had pushed her to it. “Look it sounds like you’re describing the opposite of him, so you might want to figure out whether it’s more important to have that picket fence life or whether you want to be with him,” he shrugged, “or maybe white picket fence just looks different when it’s covered in Axe Body Spray, poor life choices and too much cheap black fabric.” Which was everything he associated with Axel. That and guns. But then again Kevin didn’t exactly call someone who could shoot an unarmed man turned away a particularly good shot. You didn’t need to be good to be lucky, but if you couldn’t kill someone with five shots at point blank range then you didn’t deserve to say you were a good shot under any circumstance. “Evelyn hasn’t dated since her ex left her. And yeah I’m including myself in that ‘after’ part. So I think you’re good on that front. As long as Axel hasn’t worked that wounded bad boy shit on some other unsuspecting lady, I imagine he’s single.”

“My room mate?” she raised her eyebrow as she looked at him, how did he even know about Axel? Were they suppose to keep track of each other? Had they not agreed to just stay out of each others lives completely? Why was she always the one that actually listened to what they said and did it – and then it got held against her? Touching her forehead without realizing it, a chuckle fell from her lips as she looked up straight in the eye, “You’re kidding right? You’ve been keeping tabs on me?” Having a blown out argument with Kevin had not been penciled in her agenda, then again most of the things she had to deal weren’t either. “I get it. I am a shitty mother, I get it. I am a terrible person because I walked out my child I get it. You’re right on all counts, Kevin. I am shit. I’m sorry for ever having entered your life and making it so complicated.” She knew that if she told Kevin how she had been told their child was dead, how she had felt how she had lost the child, the depression, the drinking and how she had barely gotten herself out of the oceans that had been drowning her while at the same time she was letting Kevin back in and helping Bonnie. How her own mental state didn’t matter to Kevin; not a little. Kevin thought that Evelyn should’ve bounced up and been over the moon to find out that their daughter was alive and be ok. Maybe she should’ve, maybe something was broken in her. Which was why she had taken herself out but why waste time on the little things? “Not that it is any of your concern since we were never in love but I am not fucking Axel. He’s best friends with my brother and he’s helping him get his life together. My feelings never changed. Just forget it.” She would have to try and reach out to Bonnie and see if she had any idea.

“Yeah, you know, the guy who shot me in the chest a bunch of times after I murdered his sister,” Kevin said, “the guy.” He couldn't believe that Evelyn was living with him of all people. No more than he could believe that Ezri was still in love with him. But Kevin had zero interest in being involved in any love triangles. Not to mention the fact that he had a kid so that obviously came first. “No, Ezri keeps tabs on Axel because there’s a whole thing there. I keep tabs on him because I’d like to not get shot again.” As far as he was concerned if they started dating and wound up marrying each other, he was going to wear a bullet proof vest to the wedding. He listened to Evelyn rant and shook his head. “You’re not a shitty mother,” he said, “you’re not there. I don’t think that makes you any kind of mother.” Shitty or not if she was there he had to believe they could have figured something out. Or maybe that was him just trying to believe he could not fuck something up spectacularly. “Don’t flatter yourself, my life was already complicated long before I met you, it’s complicated long after you left.” Kevin wasn’t going to give in and admit she had changed everything. That would be like admitting his parents or Ms. Katherine had shaped his life. He was a stubborn ass like that but his stubbornness knew no bounds. “You’re right it’s not my concern. Fuck or snort whoever or whatever you want.” Illegal substances had never been his thing but the freedom to do whatever he wanted or go wherever he wanted was something he missed. Deeply. “It’s already forgotten. Hope you find whatever it is you’re looking for. I have to get back so the babysitter can go home.”

“Did you get amnesia and forget when I came back and wanted us and you basically choose her? Yeah not going to test that one out with Axel,” Perhaps because it would probably end up hurting more. At least now Ezri knew who she did love and who she wanted, she just did not know how to go about it. Or even if she should, what kind of life would they even have? Here was Kevin with a kid but missing the woman that he was in love with. Of course, she had her own two cents in that entire mess but she knew sometimes Kevin had to deal with shit on his own before that light bulb went off in his head, “It’s a bit complicated. I shouldn’t really love him after everything he did. I guess I am still trying to figure that out. Trying to see if i could ever trust him and if he even still loves me or what not,” Axel could’ve moved on as well, he had that right. They did not owe each other anything. Both of them had managed to throw knives at each other in many ways than just one. “I just thought by now I would at least be dating the man I wanted to marry. It’s not the ring or engagement I just want to be in love – have someone love me. I think I am ready for the real things. There are no more bombs waiting to come out and if they do I know how to handle them now. I don’t know – I guess you would call this just a mid life crisis of the sorts.”

Kevin cringed at the mention. He hadn't forgotten, just kind of blocked it out. “I didn’t--” he stopped, “I was hurt, we both hurt each other,” he said. They had. She had left and he had tried to pull himself away from the other half of his heart. “Besides I didn’t think you really wanted to be with me,” he admitted. He hadn’t believed her, he just thought she missed having him around. After all he’d followed her there when she had told him to go and moved onto the couch . “I can’t imagine him not loving you after everything,” Kevin said. He’d seen how over the moon Ezri was about Axel. Which was a sharp contrast to how things had been when they had been sleeping with each other. He still couldn’t call what they had a relationship, but he supposed he couldn’t really call what he had with Evelyn that either. “You shouldn’t be having a mid life crisis. You’ve got your whole life ahead of you,” Kevin said, “and take it from someone who has a kid without her mom, you don’t want to rush into things.” It still broke his heart and his mom was a fucking nightmare. He was better off without either of his parents but he always hoped if he ever had kids he’d be able to give them something more than what he had. “You’ll figure it out. Maybe try talking to him and leave the weaponry at home.” He couldn’t believe that he was advising someone to talk to Axel without heavy artillery and a bullet proof vest but he knew that Ezri could handle herself and he doubted Axel would do anything to hurt her. “Best way out of a crisis is to start moving.”

“Enjoy those moments soon she will be a teenager and you’ll be missing these moments,” At least that was what she had heard. Not that she was an expert at being a parent, his tone said it all. More judgement, which of course Evelyn would take because no one was a harder critic on herself than she was. The question was a loaded one, not because of the subject of it but because of the person voicing it, this was Kevin. The person she had learned to be honest with and go to when things got hard and even though she wanted to let herself fall into the same old habit she knew better. “I’m great. Moved back home and spending time with the family,” Nothing was a lie and nothing was the truth, at least that quality in Evelyn had managed to stay the same through all the up and downs of life. “Managed to get some things taken care of,” by that she meant she had sold the studio and used the proceeds for her brothers tenth try at rehab, which clearly had not been successful, “You might not know this but do you know what the hot spot if for illegal activity now? It’s not the same as when I used to live here and I was just trying to update my contacts,” Moments like these she wished that one of the Carmikals were around or a Talbot.

It took everything in him not to turn around and walk away before he did something stupid. There was no point in getting upset over someone who didn’t want anything to do with Vanessa. And the two of them were a packaged deal now. He’d thought dating him was full of baggage before, he had no idea what that word actually meant. “Great,” Kevin said. If she was too wrapped up in her own shit to hear him not really caring, he wasn’t going to waste his breath correcting her. Her question about him knowing illegal things almost got him to crack but he shoved it down. “You’re smart, I’m sure you’ll figure it out,” he said flatly, “you could also try asking your room mate, he tends to be good at finding illegal things.” Kevin hadn’t spoken to Axel since he shot him and he had no intention of speaking to him ever again. But if they were bullshitting he could do that to. It was better than demanding to know why she hadn’t asked about Vanessa even once.

“Because I am not doing love triangles – especially not with your ex again,” That was not something she needed to do again, she actually wanted to just find someone that could love her and well that she could love as well. Maybe Kevin just didn’t really care, he had mentioned it a couple of times. Maybe if it was any other guy – or maybe if she wasn’t that fucked up she wouldn’t had given into doing all her research. “Besides no offense to you but he is more of her type. She did date Malachy. Watch they end up fucking and then I get a damn invitation to the fucking wedding,” she picked up a pen and twirled it in her fingers figuring out how this had all come to play. “I think I could make at least top four. – I would talk to him but you see whenever he pops in I end up stabbing him or drugging him – I can’t help it. It’s a reflex,” Not to mentioned before that she had shot him. “It doesn’t matter, I think this is just coming up because another doctor got engaged and now I am one out of three doctors who are not married – but the only one that is single and I am going to hit my thirties this year – so yeah.”

“Again?” Kevin shook his head, “who knew Axel was such hot shit.” He’d never been in a love triangle so he was no expert, but wanting someone and not being able to be with them because they were in love with another person seemed like a shit deal. “Does he know you’re still in love with him?” Kevin asked, “I’m just asking because that reflex might be giving him conflicting information. No offense.” Evelyn had spent a long time saying she didn’t want to date him or had no feelings for him and he’d backed the hell off only to have her say she was in love with him. And no guns or knives or any weapons had come out. Not that he held their physical violence in much higher regard. “And if you don’t want an invitation to the wedding you might want to push that down.” Ezri had been through a lot of shit and come out it the other side. But even if she hadn’t, Kevin knew he would still think she deserved to be happy. “Listen you’ve lived more in those thirty years than those people have. You had to lose out somewhere and dating’s probably the way to sacrifice. Besides, people are living a lot longer and getting married later. It’s not like turning thirty is a death sentence.” Once Kevin had turned 18 he’d considered everything after that to be gravy. Since once they were past 18 they couldn’t be sent back to Ms. Katherine and that had always been his goal in life. To keep them away from her. “You could get engaged tomorrow if thats what you wanted, you know that right?”

The moment that he replied she felt every emotion she had managed to shove into a box just come pouring down at her demanding to be felt again. Her jaw locked immediately as her nerves kicked into flight mode but her tiredness overrode it as she stood still before she covered her face and knew she couldn’t just run. “What?” All the memories she had with Kevin she did her best to not go back and revisit them. After countless of nights of trying to figure out where it all went wrong she just came down to two conclusions, she had messed it up by not embracing motherhood but he also gave up on her. As soon as she didn’t fall in line with his plan it was as if she was the enemy. In all that she had no recollection regarding the pizza business, not to mention that she was on the mission of looking for her idiotic brother that couldn’t keep his life straight long enough for Evelyn to breathe. It was funny how she had become the anchor of the Maxwell family, a family that she hadn’t even been born to but a family that had never given up on her – it was broken but it was her family. Even if her biological mother was a queen she would never recognize her as her mother. “I’m not, just passing through town have um…some business dealing with some things. How are you?” If she was already in this painful position she figured civility was something she could offer up, she did need a break to recollect herself after two days of searching.

Evelyn looked exhausted and frayed and if it was any other situation Kevin would have had some kind of sympathy. Probably. He’d been trying to have sympathy for more people after everything. But he’d also been trying to be with Evelyn. And while that had been happening their daughter had been trapped with the fae. She’d been hurting. And respecting Evelyn’s wishes to do nothing had delayed her being rescued for almost a year. It was hard not to look at Evelyn and see those first few nights when Vanessa had wailed for the only home that she had ever known and whatever the fae had been putting in her system. It was hard not to see how he’d been doing this alone after Evelyn walked away. And it was hard to see her and not think about what she was doing with Axel. Kevin wasn’t sure he had a right to all of those things but he decided that he sure as hell had a right to be annoyed at the man who shot him in the chest a bunch of times after he had let him come so close. “Well I’m caring for Vanessa so I’m doing as well as any new single dad with a crying baby at home,” he said, “how are you?”

Life had not been easy since pushing Kevin out, apparently what everyone said about losing the one you loved was true. Not having them in your life managed to make a giant hole in your soul and things that once held great importance no longer did. Evelyn stopped touching her paints and her sketch books started to collect dust – Axel was a shit room mate but even he managed to see that Evelyn had changed but she didn’t dare to reach out to Kevin. Nothing she said made sense and when she tried to explain it to anyone she could hear herself yelling to herself to stop being so damn pathetic and weak. At least her girl had one good parent figure, that was more than Evelyn had been given at the end. At the end she had a drug addict brother and a father that was more paranoid than here, which explained why she let Axel live with her in her mansion because her father had his moments where he could turn violent and his brother’s habits managed to put them in danger. Maybe she could get those two right then she could try this mother thing – or maybe she would find another reason to bail. Which was why today she was walking through town without a true north, because once again her brother was missing. As she searched for him she fought the thoughts that she would find him laying by trash dead – or shot. As she scanned the scene her eyes landed on a similar figure, Kevin. It felt like lifetimes since she last saw him, looking down she cleared her nose before lifting her gaze up and figuring it was best to say hello than to completely ignore him, even if her fight or flight instincts heavily laid on flight. “Hey –fancy seeing you in town.”

Evelyn shacking up with Axel was just salt in a very deep wound. Kevin could acknowledge that. After all the woman was free to shack up with whoever she wanted. He never saw the appeal in Axel but then again he’d never seen the appeal in himself either. And now everything had shifted. His own shit mattered a lot less now that he had a person to take care of. And raise. He be an example for. Jesus. It was a terrible thought matched only by the knowledge of how badly he had wanted a parent in his life. Someone to say he was worth the terror. That was the thing that kept him grounded and there. Rather than finding a good home for the kid he had no business raising. He now had babysitters a nanny, all of whom he knew way way too much about. But he was nothing if not thorough and doing things half asses had never really been Kevin’s forte. And just when Kevin felt like he had his feet somewhat under him, the sound of someone clearing their nose and tentatively speaking to him brought it all crashing down spectacularly. “Picking up some things. Surprised you’re still around. How’s the pizza business going?”

Being a doctor was killing her social life. Her biggest interaction was with an almost one year old and her ex boyfriend – well one of them and patching up the other ex. It was great, fantastic, she was truly living the life she had always dreamt about especially with the lack of sleep. Ezri figured it made sense for her to somewhat be living with Kevin, it was safe. In a strange way they had managed to become friends again and she didn’t regret but trying to explain to a one night stand how you lived with a past flame, well that tended to kill the mood right away. “We can talk about how your ex is now living with my ex and skip the part of where I kind of became a stalker and looked this information online – did you know your ex – who I thought was homeless – to be fair she did live everywhere is actually filthy rich? or I guess we can talk about how this season of the Bachelor is so stupid and I’m glad that it is almost over – or about how I am so close to interviewing to be one of those girls that goes onto the reality show to find love.”

“Why are you being such a masochist about this?” Kevin questioned. Evelyn had slapped him and walked out on him and Vanessa while the latter was crying in her crib. “Maybe you and Evelyn can be in a love triangle with Axel. But be careful, he’s a heartbreaker. Or shooter.” Axel had murdered him and ruined his life in every way possible. There was a certain irony to the fact that the two people who had destroyed his life in very different ways wound up shacking up together. “You’d be great on one of those shows. You’re a hot doctor. They love that shit. Me and Vanessa will be here cheering you on in your quest for love.” It was odd to hear Ezri talk about going on one of those shows or even talk about dating again but Kevin pushed that feeling aside. “Radical idea but you could also talk to Axel and sort that out, if you know you wanted to date him again.”

I don’t understand how one tiny person can be this much work,” Kevin admitted, “I know she’s my daughter but how can one tiny person be this much trouble.” Kevin had zero experience with parenting and he was pretty sure that Ezri was in a similar boat. Being a parent wasn’t exactly something he had planned. He was usually much more careful when it came to shit like this. Mostly because ehe had no idea how to be in charge of an innocent tiny human. He was much better at being in charge of criminals or ex cons trying to turn their lives around. “this has got to be some kind of karma,” he said, “I guess I deserve worse.” Seriously he had no business being in charge of a human being like this. “Please tell me something non baby related. I need to hear something from an adult.” @grootrps

stilesedit

I don’t need to get taken to get into the Hunt. Okay. Seems like you got an idea, let’s disc-

“You need to stop expecting such negativity,” Ezri ended up surprising herself when the words ended up coming out of her lips. The brunette had always expected that Kevin and Carter would be the ones to actually get their life together before she did. She had been the one to have fallen in love with a mass murderer or serial killer; whatever the political correct terminology was today. However here she was happy that Kevin was a father, hoping that the baby girl would be enough to drag him out of whatever hell hole he had managed to put himself into – and yes she said himself because he did have some say in how things were going. “You did. But I am not going to be hung up on that, Kevin. Look if I got hung up on everything you ever did wrong, everything Carter did wrong and everything I did wrong I would be as depressed as you look right now and I don’t want that. Maybe I am fucked up. I probably do accept that – I mean I am still in love with Axel so something has to be wrong right – and the cherry on top of everything is that I rather hurt him than admit that to him,” It was perhaps the first time that the woman had ever admitted it out loud. The shock was still left on her face for a couple of seconds before she decided to move along, it didn’t matter. Not like she would see Axel any time soon – not since she managed to stab him at the hospital completely ignoring the oath she had taken. It was amazing the things that Axel managed to bring out in her. “All I am saying is if I don’t hate you – and everyone else doesn’t hate you – at least the majority then you should probably just chill. Then maybe the mother is going through something and needs to figure it out especially since knowing you – you probably went to an extreme and just wanted to have her switch 100% right away.” Not to mention that when Kevin set his mind on something it didn’t matter what anyone said; it was too late to even change his mind. “She could’ve aborted your kid if we’re talking about the same woman,” The werewolf had heard about Evelyn, and there was nothing that she wouldn’t do for her own freedom so the fact that she had a kid probably did mean it was more than a like but who was she to voice anything on his love life, “Do what you want Kevin. Just be able to live with yourself. You’re going to be a good father, anyone that knows you knows that. Have some faith in yourself. If you want you can stay here – It’ll be nice to have some family here – and yes I still do consider you family. Let’s not get into another debate about that because I might just punch you and I’m really really working on my anger issues.”

“I’m not being negative, I’m being realistic,” Kevin pointed out. He and Ezri had always had a different view of the world. Or they had since puberty anyway. At one point Kevin had been optimistic but life had taught him that things were different, that it was better to see the world as it actually was and not as it could be. “And I’m not depressed, I’m sleep deprived. My daughter thinks I’m some stranger who came in and kidnapped her. She’s scared.” Of all the fucked up things to happen in his life, that was the worst. Having his heart broken by Ezri, his parents not loving him, getting murdered twice, selling drugs--none of it was as bad as the fact that his daughter didn’t know him. “Come on Ez, you’ve been in love with Axel since we were teenagers. It’s a fucked up situation but you both probably have an equal amount of baggage at this point. Maybe call it even and try again if you still love each other.” Kevin had watched her be in love with Axel for years before Axel shot him in revenge for killing his sister. Which, Kevin could grudgingly admit, he deserved. He didn’t think Axel had just been using Ezri either, he knew the man had fallen for her. Kevin loved Ezri as well, with every fiber of his being. He loved her enough to respect her choice to be with Axel, if that was what she wanted. He would respect any choice that she made. Kevin pressed his lips together. Unpacking his daughter’s maternity issues with the only woman he had imagined having a family with was a weird thing on the heels of her saying she loved someone else. But he’d fucked up their relationship enough to try. “If she had that would have been her choice,” he said, “She didn’t tell me about being pregnant or having the kid. Which I get, I wouldn’t want me around a kid either. But I’m the kid’s dad, she’s gone and that’s kind of the end of it.” He hated how things had ended up, but God Vanessa deserved better than parents who didn’t want her. Better than spending so long among the fae and all their fucked up stuff. “Thanks but I have an apartment,” Kevin said, “besides I’d rather us be able to talk than what happened the last time we lived together.” Next to the eight months he’d spend in the hospital after being shot, the months he’d spent sleeping on the couch while he and Ezri tore each other apart was the worst of his life. Not something he was anxious to repeat. “I wasn’t going to debate you on whether or not we’re family,” he said holding his hands up in a gesture of surrender, “and I definitely don’t want you to punch me. I’m still working on getting the whole magic thing under control.” Kevin hated any shortcomings in himself or admitting them, especially to Ezri, but it was probably best to rip the whole ‘not really a fae’ bandaide off.

“Would it really be that bad?” She didn’t understand why Kevin always had this low image of himself. Did he really not see how everyone else saw him and now everyone else cared about him? Not only cared but loved him? Was Kevin truly that blind to reality? Then again she knew the answer to that. Everyone that grew up with Katherine had that vision issue. Ezri thought she was trash; actually on a good day she thought that trash was better than her. After all this was Ezri, the woman that had lied to half the people she knew in her life and went by another name and another lifestyle because of the CIA – the woman who killed someone; and even though it was justified she felt that she never cleaned off the blood off her hands. Then she was the woman that had fallen in love three times with three different individual and had given up the notion of love happening for her because she didn’t believe she had anything to give away. Axel had taken the majority of her innocence and pure love, then Teddy just managed to take away the fighter she had once been and Kevin took the hope of romance and eternal love. Yet throughout the past years that she had learn that none of them were at fault for how cynical and afraid she was. This was a burden that she had to get over all on her own. “I just don’t think that it would be bad if she turned out to be like you. Which part are you ashamed of? How loyal you are? Honest? Sure, you have shit qualities too but we all do. And believe it or not your daughter will have them too. It’s part of being human. As long as you’re there for her and you love her unconditionally then that is all you can do. Isn’t that all we wanted from our said parents?” Lord knew that it had been for her, but she knew that not everyone shared that. “Maybe she does have the mother gene. Sometimes leaving is the motherly thing to do not many parents know when to walk away and damage their kids even further,” Lord knew that if her mother had actually struck around Ezri would be an entire different person – and not the good kind. “I think you’re doing a fantastic job, give yourself a damn break and whoever the mother is – give her a break too. There must have been a reason as to why you inserted your penis into her.”

“Do you really have to ask?” Kevin said with a tight smile. Imagining the world doing to Vanessa what it had done to him made his stomach drop. Kevin knew he was a product of his life, that he hadn’t been strong enough to keep them safe and be a good person. No-one had noticed he was drowning but he couldn’t blame them for that. Even now admitting his fear that his daughter would be like him tasted like barbs in his mouth. “Yeah her being honest like me is definitely a fear,” he said, the smile falling off his face at Ezri’s earnestness. “I lied to you for years and then I let you think I was dead, you really want to laud my honesty?” Sometimes he thought Ezri looked back on things with a completely different view which, granted, had been his intention. But there was a part of him that was hurt it had worked so well and so horribly at the same time. What did he want from his parents was a loaded question. One he hated asking himself. Mostly because when he had been his parents age when they had him, having a kid would have been the worst thing in the world. “My bar for my parents was way lower.” Kevin had wanted them desperately but what he wanted and what he needed to survive had always been two different things. And he always chose the latter, right up until Vanessa. Now though he imagined he was going to be making even harder choices. “Trust me, she’s got the mother gene. She had it enough to hide being pregnant and then lie about the kid for almost a year.” That slipped out before Kevin had the mindset to concoct some lie. But it was the truth. With Ezri it was. thousand little things, with Evelyn it had been one big thing. But those thousand little things seemed little. Now when Vanessa screamed at night for the Fae realm, the only home she had ever known, Kevin just saw Evelyn telling him not to look for her. “Not when it comes to the kid,” Kevin said, “we were working on all the other stuff--getting nowhere but trying--but this is different. There’s no getting past this for me.” He had really though Evelyn and he would figure it out. But again, he wound up with everything being on her terms and when she had been ready to be in love and he had still been working on forgiveness, it had fallen apart. Still maybe they could have gotten past that. But there was no getting past what her actions had done to the child she couldn’t even look at. Not for him. “We had sex because I liked her,” he said, “then she found out she was pregnant and vanished. You can like someone, that doesn’t mean anything.” Maybe his view of love was the most cynical but again that was circumstances. And experience. “I’m going to enjoy threatening the people who come to date my daughter,” he added, trying to find the humor in the situation, "I think I'll be good at that."

It was easy for him to pass judgement with the information that he had; and if there was anything that Evelyn did for the people she loved it was just that. Roll out the carpet and give them a round of applause. Down the road she would perhaps regret it and some canvas images would actually reveal what she was feeling but his eyes would never lay on it. “I never asked you to.” She didn’t hold any resentment or bitterness towards Kevin; she loved him just like she had back then – perhaps even more now but it didn’t change various facts. “She’s all yours. I will never try to hold you back. I’m not playing any games here or holding anything against you.” The only thing she was not doing was offering any real explantation to her actions but that too would be forgotten throughout the years. “Then nothing you will have.” As she heard the voice of her daughter she stood paralyzed for a couple of seconds but what felt like an eternity to her before her fingers entangled around the knob and opened the door, within the few passing seconds she could’ve swore the door had managed to get heavier as she shut it behind her, pushing aside any emotion that dared to recount her steps

Maybe she was expecting him to go after her, to fight for her, but Kevin couldn’t. It had been bad enough when she had not let him be part of Vanessa’s brief time on earth, but he liked to think he could have gotten over it. At least he had understood that. Now her actions had turned them both into his parents. A runaway mother who wanted nothing to do with their kid and an oblivious father. Vanessa deserved better. But if all Kevin could offer was a dad who showed up, then that was what he would do. “Then goodbye,” Kevin said simply and walked back into the room where Vanessa was fussing, pulling her out of the cradle. She still felt strange in his arms, foreign. But he pushed aside the misgivings and carefully cradled her like he used to do with the infants at the orphanage so Miss Katherine wouldn’t hear them screaming. “Sorry about that,” he said to her, tucking her closer, “you’re okay now.”

Ezri had not been drinking; she hadn’t drank in an entire year mostly because she prefer to be sober at least then she could owe up to all her decision making and yet she felt what she could remember as the sobering up effect. Because she was trying to figure out how the hell Kevin was standing in front of her and saying that she had a kid. This was wild; the notion that they were old enough to have their own kids though if she was being completely fair they were old enough to have kids a couple of years ago but to have families – to you know – do grown up stuff and be held accountable for it. “So you’re in charge of an entire mini me?” Ezri couldn’t even keep a lucky bamboo alive for a couple of months ago because they usually died within the third month mostly because she had forgotten that she even had one. And here was Kevin; the guy that couldn’t stay still for a more couple of months before he had an itch to move or an order to go to a new town, “So what you’re out of the CIA? They saw the kid and said bygones be bygones? Or have you hidden her from them as well? I am just trying to understand how you have managed to keep your life and include her in it – nothing against it. I am rather impressed that you have done it. I always thought you would be a good father – as I have said before,” Perhaps she was repeating herself too much. “Ah – so she’s not going to help you at all? Not everyone has you know the mother gene in them. Lord knows I don’t so I can understand – I mean it sucks but I guess it’s better to be taken out than fuck someone over.” Which is what would’ve happened if she would’ve been raised by her biological parents; at least that was what her brother had told her and the few minutes she met her parents she realized how right he was. “Perhaps you just have not met the right one. I have heard it takes a couple of tries.” she shared the wisdom that had been passed down towards her as she rubbed the palms against the side of her head

God what if Vanessa was like him? The thought had never occurred to Kevin until Ezri joked about it. Kevin was no-one’s idea of a good kid, much less a kid to be emulated and as an adult he was even worse. “I’m in charge of my daughter,” he said, “if she turns out like me I’ve done something horribly wrong.” Kevin always wondered what kind of person he would be if his upbringing was more normal. Would he be a good person? Or was the darkness inside him that made him fuck everything up just a part of who he was? He could have been worse. When Ezri joked about the CIA, a shiver went down his spine. How much time had passed since they spoke? About anything except how their relationship failed? “I’m not on probation anymore,” Kevin mumbled and then cleared his throat, “I’m just another guy at the agency with a kid. It’s not that big a deal to them,” he shrugged, “and the company I run, we have childcare so even if I have to jet off, she’s taken care of.” Kevin had started a company when he’d invented a new paintball formula. And he made a point to hire ex cons and runaways who didn't have a lot of options. Those cons had kids usually, so Kevin made sure there was a way to take care of them. He didn’t want anyone being as desperate as him. The entire messy story of Vanessa threatened to spill from Kevin’s lips but he bit it back. He wouldn’t do that. The only respectable thing his father had done in his opinion was not trash his mom. And his mom had been more than happy to speak horribly of his father. “I don’t know if she has the mother gene or not,” Kevin said, “she left to protect the kid from me, but once she was here--” he stopped, “anyways she doesn’t want to be involved and I respect that. I don’t want Vanessa grown up thinking she’s not wanted.” Did kids remember when they were months old? He hoped Vanessa wouldn’t remember her early months in the fae world. But hell if he knew. Kevin shook his head. “I’m done with all that,” he said, “and besides I don’t want Vanessa to have an endless carousel of mother figures without an actual mom.” He shuddered, “God, who the hell is letting me try to be a good example to a kid. I have no business doing this.”

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